Signs of hope for deficit plan

A bipartisan effort to resurrect the recommendations of last year’s presidential deficit-reduction commission gained steam Tuesday in the Senate, where nearly half the members turned out for early morning briefing on the debt crisis and old friends of House Speaker John Boehner are taking the lead alongside the Democratic chairman of the Senate Budget Committee.

The path ahead remains extremely difficult, but the forces coming together represent the best shot this Congress has of finding the political mass needed to bring President Barack Obama and the new House Republican majority to the table.

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“I think we will make it easier for him to jump in,” said Sen. Tom Coburn (R-Okla.) of the president. “None of us know how we can go yet,” said Sen. Richard Burr (R-N.C.). “But if we can bring the White House to the table on Social Security, the House will be there”

Watching from a distance, exchanging colorful e-mails while talking up business audiences, are the commission co-chairs, former Sen. Alan Simpson (R-Wyo.) and Erskine Bowles, a former White House chief-of-staff under Democratic President Bill Clinton.

“The wonderful thing that is clear is there is movement,” Simpson told POLITICO. “It’s inside baseball, but the connectors are connecting.”

Under Simpson and Bowles, the 18-member commission recommended a nearly $4 trillion 10-year deficit reduction plan in December but fell three votes short of the super-majority required for action. House opposition was crucial to this loss, but senators of both parties joined in the 11-7 vote for approval and are crucial to the movement now.

The fact that an estimated 49 senators turned out on an icy morning Tuesday for an 8:30 a.m. briefing on the debt issue surprised many. “I think people realize if they don’t do something, they’ll be out of a job,” said Sen. Johnny Isakson (R-Ga.). “My father taught me you need the inspiration of desperation.”

Hours later at a Senate Budget Committee hearing, Chairman Kent Conrad (D-N.D.) was more declarative than a week ago.

“What I said at the last hearing, I think even more strongly today. It has to start somewhere. And in a congressional process, we are it. ‘